MC Tribal Players Present Importance of Being Earnest

February 11, 2013

Tickets go on sale in mid-February for the Mississippi College production of “The Importance of Being Earnest” at the Aven Little Theater.

Starring the MC Tribal Players, the Department of Communication presentation March 21-24 sheds light on the hypocrisy of Victorian society and is “full of unexpected twists,” says professor Phyllis Seawright, the play’s director. “The audience will be guessing who Earnest really is up until the last minute.”

Written by Oscar Wilde, who was born in Dublin in October 1854, the play made its debut at the St. James Theatre in London in February 1895.

“The action of this quintessential English farce moves quickly from a London townhouse to a grand country estate in Hertfordshire, where it’s always teatime and love is in the air,” Seawright says. Characters in the play range from “wealthy and shallow aristocrats to faithful, longsuffering servants,” the director said.

“The play revolves around comedy. It’s light-hearted and easy to grasp,” says MC student Britton McCall of Natchez. She plays the role of Jack Worthing, a respectable young man leading a double life.

MC senior Kim Dingess of Dallas plays the role of Gwendolyn Fairfax, who’s in love with Worthing. “I love how the characters’ personalities are all over the place.”

In her first Mississippi College production, Nicola Callahan of Meridian takes on the role of sweet, little Cecily Cardew. “I love the play. It’s a bit of a romantic comedy, but in the Edwardian period.”

Getting cast in a comedy is extra fun, I think, because I have a chance to act all zany and silly and make the audience laugh,” Callahan says. “The characters are just ridiculous in this play – they pretend to be posh, upstanding Brits.”

The first performance on the Clinton campus will be 7 p.m. Thursday March 21. Other show times will be noon and 7 p.m. on Friday March 22, and 7 p.m. on Saturday March 23. The final performance will be 2:30 p.m. on Sunday March 24.

Tickets are $5 for students, MC employees and senior adults and $8 for general admission at the door. To make reservations, call 601.925.3935 beginning in mid-February. For more information, contact Phyllis Seawright at 601.925.3453 or seawrigh@mc.edu.